October 7, 2010

I'm reading the transcript of the oral argument in Summers v. Phelps — the First Amendment case that we were talking about yesterday — substantively! — here and here. This post is about the English language. At page 40, Margie Phelps, arguing in favor of the right to express outrageous opinions in the vicinity of a funeral, is quoted as saying:

I think approaching an individual up close and in their grille to berate them gets you out of the zone of protection, and we would never do that.

(Boldface added.) Then, at pages 47-48, she's quoted saying:

Your body of law about captive audience... where they, by the way, specifically said at footnote this isn't about content. You've got to be up -- again, I will uses [sic] the colloquial term -- up in your grill. The term I think the Court used was confrontational.

And page 49:

I do think that you could have a public event where there was not an element of vulnerability in the people going in. You might even let them up in their grill.

You cook on a grill (perhaps in a “bar and grill”), but the word for a metal framework over the front of an opening is most often grille. When speaking of intensive questioning “grill” is used because the process is being compared to roasting somebody over hot coals: “whenever I came in late, my parents would grill me about where I’d been.”

All right. So when you get up in somebody's grill/grille, what's the image: getting very close to the front of his car or somehow snuggling under the lid of his Weber? I Googled "what does get 'get up in his grill' mean" and – the world is so strange! — the second hit was to my blog:

k*thy said... I'd have no problem if she'd get up in his grill and then gone after his cycles with a bat.

Well, I didn't write that, and I think it's "grille." We're talking about the car, aren't we? Or do you think it has to do with that hip hop-style jewelry, worn over teeth? But what is that a reference to: the car part or the cooking surface? Wikipedia spells that "grill," but Googling around, I see a lot of pictures of Corvettes with "grille teeth." I even found one that I took:

Have I resolved it yet? If not, I submit the truly humble and unexceptionable request that spelling should be consistent within the transcript (and, if it's not too much to ask, all of the work of the Supreme Court). So pick one. I say "grille." (And I love those old Corvettes!)

Thunder, thunder over thunder road with grilles going by like they are standing still. I suspect that the phrase "getting into someone's grille" refers to going up to someone's eyes rather than to their their mouth. It is done to suddenly intimidate, and that requires a threat to disable their eyes. Anyway it is done, it is a control action. However, it is not really torture unless you do blind them.

I'm suggesting that the dental jewelry ought to be spelled "grille" because of the Corvettes. I do understand that people transcribing spoken slang have generally spelled it without the "e" -- including the New York Times. Isn't the etymology that it comes from the car and not the cooking device?

Control of others is not about controlling their mouth/dental braces. It is all about controling what the controllee looks at and whether their eyes lower and demur to the asserting master or are still cooly staring back and seeing weaknesses in the attacker.

"Isn't the etymology that it comes from the car and not the cooking device?"

Yes, but in stages. First the car inspired grille became slang for certain dental presentations. Then the phrase "up in your face" was updated to the slangier "up in your grille" based on the dental tie in.

Isn't the etymology that it comes from the car and not the cooking device?

I've always used "grill" to mean both the cooking surface and the car's front end. In fact, I've used "grill" to mean any metal lattice. If I'd ever stopped to consider it, I would have supposed "grille" was the British version of "grill", akin to "color" vs. "colour".

"I'm suggesting that the dental jewelry ought to be spelled 'grille' because of the Corvettes." Suggest away, middle-aged boomer white woman. Or, you know, listen to those that actually know what they're talking about.

"You people are freaking annoying. The Crack Emcee gave you the answer, you don't have to suppose it."

You're annoying. The original post understands that it's slang and what it means. The question is how grille ought to be spelled. The original post acknowledges the dental jewelry and that it's prominently spelled "grill" but questions whether that should be or should have become the right spelling. And in any case, the point is that the transcript alternates between 2 spellings.

"They invented it and therefore get to establish the proper spelling."

That's patronizing. I'm critical of the spelling of the local Irish Bar and Grille. I inquire into and comment on spelling and usage and metaphor. It's one of my main topics. Don't get me started on race and patronizing people. It is also one of my topics.

Althouse, as I said above, it was inappropriate, and I will bet that she was not aware of the black meaning. Probably, like me, she thought it meant 'to get in another's face.' I would have thought it was more of a country/red-neck phrase.

"Althouse, as I said above, it was inappropriate, and I will bet that she was not aware of the black meaning. Probably, like me, she thought it meant 'to get in another's face.' I would have thought it was more of a country/red-neck phrase."

The fact that Phelps used it is some evidence that it actually is a country phrase. It could have dual origins or it could have migrated from one place to another. Maybe country folk were talking about their cars and trucks and used a phrase that then got caught up in urban slang.

I wouldn't assume you know the origin -- certainly not from checking Urban Dictionary and the voting that takes place there.

Often an old phrase, like "hoist by his own petard" gets used by people who don't know what the image is and over time they end up with quite the wrong image, but it becomes the right one. Think about how people say "toe the line" and would spell it "tow the line."

Maybe some country guy who said "up in your grille" moved to the city and said it a lot, where it was heard by people who knew about the dental jewelry and imagined teeth rather than the front of cars, and they went on to spread the phrase in the new context.

But I still get back to the point that I think the origin of the word for the dental jewelry is the car and not the thing you cook meat on. The pictures of Corvettes are so persuasive to me.

Yes, I agree with all you say, especially that the meaning in both senses rests on the car grille. Which, I will admit, I did not know ended in an e. But I would still say that car grille and BBQ grill have the same origin (as I'm sure probably do to).

So Althouse wants to take the spelling used by people who have actually been using the expression for years and change it because they didn't spell it rationally. And I am being patronizing? I call it respect for precedent.

This is not to say anything against the post itself--it is interesting and funny. I just think the spelling should remain as it has been. The post entertains, it does not convince. Except that, yes the spelling should be consistent within a transcript.

Grilles - car grilles, that is - resemble a mouthful of teeth. (The resemblance may be more or less obvious depending on exactly what kind of old grille you're looking at.) To my recollection, the expression goes back a lot farther than the teeth-jewelry fad, although that probably made an old-fashioned phrase more popular among people with such jewelry. (Which is why Crack Emcee thinks it's "black slang".)

Okay. A long time ago when my daughter was in about the 4th grade, and my son in the 8th, my daughter asked him angrily, 'why are you getting up in my grill?' My son and I burst out laughing because it sounded so funny coming from her. As I said I hadn't heard it before, and figured it was country/red-neck. I just asked my son, as non-leadingly as possible, if it was a country thing, and he said, 'no, it's definitely gangsta.'

So Crack and muddimo, excuse the hell out of me (that's a white saying).

It's interesting how the mere suggestion it could be black, as opposed to country, gets some people a little hot under the collar. It reads like that, anyway. I'm not suggesting racism so much as pride. It's weird. We're all Americans.

I'd bet "grille" is both black and country - resulting from us spending so many happy times together - and it's definitely a reference to cars.

"It's interesting how the mere suggestion it could be black, as opposed to country, gets some people a little hot under the collar."

People here seem to have a hard time believing that something which started as urban was adopted so readily outside, including in rural areas. This track has been becoming more common since at least the 80's, and with greater speed. The fact that something appeared in rural or country culture doesn't make it less likely it began as urban.

Nationally syndicated radio host Jim Rome, who's patter is so filled with stylistic patois that his Web page used to (sorry didn't check its present state) have its own glossary (or "gloss" in his gloss). Anyway, Rome has used the term "grille" interchangeably with "face" for 20 years -- at least. Much of his gloss is derived from slang slung by Black athletes. Tracing the etymology through Romey, I would lean more toward the Black than the country origins explanation. Of course, many athletes come from the country too, but Romey has a special fondness for the patois of Black athletes.